Colin and the Mary-Kates

Gratitude and air kisses going out this morning to Mary's Book Club (a.k.a. Kate's Book Club) in Kirkland, Washington. As with the "Widows" Book Group a few weeks back, these lovely ladies were inviting me back for the second time! You gotta love a group that will talk with you at great length about your first book and then be willing to give up one of the precious twelve slots to do your sequel. To make room for The Littlest Doubts, they doubled up for November because--hey--no one has anything else going on in November (???). How about Marlo Morgan's Mutant Message Down Under and Greg Grandin's Fordlandia for an odd pairing?

This outspoken book club was one of the first to host Mourning Becomes Cassandra, and when I say that talking to readers made me think about things I hadn't considered before, these are the readers I had in mind. Very insightful. Liz, so far, has been the first and only reader to pick up on a Pride and Prejudice-inspired plot development in TLD. (See? I don't just post pictures of Colin Firth for my health.) They argued about where the Palace was located and where Cass fell off her bike and whether firemen like people popping by. They wanted to know where Cass and Skandar got coffee, if I'd ever been to a video game convention, whether Cass acted out of judgment or fear. Mary had some observations and corrections to my hospital scene and offered her services in reading over medical scenes in the future. Invaluable. That makes one nurse, one pharmacist, and two lawyers in the stable. If anyone out there was also a turn-of-the-century redwood logger in California, please contact me. Not kidding.

Another pioneer of the evening was First Reader to Read the Sequel Without Reading MBC. This was a horror for me ranking up with all those Readers Who Read the Ending First coming out of the woodwork. I've only once read books out of order (Nicholas Sparks' At First Sight--still haven't read True Believer), and it gave me a queasy feeling, like I'd skipped a grade without actually learning my times tables. This is my personal problem, however, because the sequel-reader seemed perfectly at peace--just like all those ending-spoilers.

All in all, a lovely, lively meeting. There were even brownies, which I was secretly hoping for. And the Mary-Kates have invited me back for next year, to talk about whichever of my three current projects I manage to complete. Thanks, ladies. XOXO.